Legacy
by Kitsune no Rai
Summary: Upon seeing their father's dead body, the Sand Siblings recount their relationship with him as both the Kazekage and as a father and face the fact that now, all they have is each other.
1. Realization

This fanfiction takes place shortly after the Sand/Sound Invasion.

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto.

**Chapter I: Realization **

It was another sandstorm again. The sky was made invisible by the sand as Temari looked outside the window from inside the Kazekage tower. The building held a somber mood as the fierce presence of Sunagakure's leader was no more. She glanced once again over out the window sighing deeply. Finding nothing more to look at and turned to her two younger brothers. Kankuro stood several feet away from her slowly removing his puppet from his back and hitting his shoulders in an attempt to generate much needed movement from them. Gaara remained in the far corner of the room away from his siblings standing by the desk that their father once frequently occupied, his face unreadable.

"Well, I guess we can say that mission was a failure," Kankuro said, breaking the silence.

Temari's eyes jolted back to Kankuro. "How can you joke at a time like this? The Kazekage- our father… He's dead, and we don't know what happened to him." Temari thought back to a couple hours ago. There, lying on a cold table lay her father's body, decomposing with several maggots on his skin. She watched as one of the medic-nin in the room removed the maggots one by one.

"It's not that difficult to joke about this. He went out like a wimp. Besides, we know what happened. He got stabbed in the heart," Kankuro retorted sitting down where he once stood, mimicking a stabbing motion with his hand. Temari pulled herself back to the present.

"Kankuro, you-"

"Enough," Gaara spoke up, silencing the two while taking a few steps forward toward his siblings. Their eyes widened as he approached. Gaara stopped for a moment. He stood there with a calculating look on his face before his eyes showed complete understanding of the situation. "I'm not going to kill you."

Temari was clearly surprised. It was hard for her to believe hearing Gaara say 'not' and 'kill' to someone in the same sentence. She sensed some sincerity in his voice.

"_Maybe him apologizing to us in Konoha was not a joke after all."_

Kankuro still maintained a weary glare, but it wasn't enough to make Gaara refrain from approaching them.

"We know who killed the Kazekage!" A ninja male burst opened the door wildly in a fit of anger and excitement, almost tripping over the three stairs that lay in front of the door.

"Who?" Temari asked.

"Orochimaru."

"How do you know for sure," Kankuro stood up once again, shifting his attention to the man at the door.

"We did an autopsy on the Kazekage and found saliva surrounding the wound. Orochimaru is infamous for hiding weapons in his mouth. This, coupled with the fact that we have eyewitness reports that Orochimaru masqueraded as the Kazekage and revealed himself once the invasion on Konohagakure began, leads us to believe that Orochimaru is the murderer of the Fourth Kazekage."

The room went silent upon hearing the feral growl Gaara released from his lips. The man slowly moved out of the office, nearly tripping on the stairs again, and closed the door behind him leaving the threesome alone once again.

"Orochimaru," Gaara mumbled.

"He betrayed us all," Kankuro said.

Temari walked over toward the chair behind the desk. She leaned her fan on a nearby wall before sitting down in the chair her father once occupied every day. She had a full view of the medium sized room. Straight acroos from her was the giant window she was looking at earlier. In the middle of the sand-colored carpeted floor was the Sand Village's emblem of the hourglass. On the right lay three stairs that led to the only door in the room. Right beside the desk was a huge bookshelf that was filled with books neatly stacked. Her father was neat freak. Even the papers on the desk were organized by use and stacked without a hint of disorder to be seen.

"I can't believe you are sitting in that man's desk," Kankuro chided, anger apparent in his voice.

"Shut-up, Kankuro."

"Look Temari, he wasn't exactly father-of-the-year material you know," Kankuro continued. "He put us through a lot of crap."

Temari slammed her hands fiercely into the desk. "Don't you think I know that? I'm not a fool, Kankuro! I know full well what he was like!" She looked over to see Gaara standing by the door with an indifferent look. She could feel a giant lump in her throat as she tried to form the words to talk to Gaara.

"What, Temari?" Gaara spoke up.

Temari's eyes widened a little as she tried to regain her thoughts. "W-What do you think about this, Gaara?" The words came out slow and clearly lingered with fear.

Gaara raised an eyebrow before pushing himself off the wall he was propped onto and turning to face the door. "I really don't care. You two can do whatever you want. I'm leaving."

Temari and Kankuro stared at the door blankly as it closed behind Gaara.

Temari refocused on Kankuro. "Kankuro, why don't you go after him?"

"I'm not crazy about dying just yet."

Temari chuckled a little before sitting back down in the seat.

"Why don't you go after him, Temari?"

"I doubt Gaara would want anything to do with either of us right now."

"He's such a pain."

The room went quiet. The only exception was the sand hitting the outside of the windows. Kankuro let out a sigh as he walked over to his puppet. He gave it a quick overview before picking it up and setting it on his back once again.

"Kankuro?"

"What now?"

"What do you think about what Gaara said when we were leaving the Leaf Village?"

Kankuro looked up at the ceiling for a moment. "You mean that apology?" Temari nodded. "I'm not buying it."

Kankuro continued upon seeing his sister's surprised reaction. She was clearly taken aback. "I can't believe you find it so easy to forgive him, Temari. He's a monster. One wrong move, and you're dead. Do you honestly expect me to forgive him because he said 'I'm sorry' after getting his butt handed to him by that Uzumaki kid? No. Brother or not, I know who what he really is. It's time for you to wake up and see that too. I'm leaving." Kankuro marched towards the door.

Temari rose once again from her seat. "Kankuro, he's our brother. He's all we have left."

Kankuro grabbed the doorknob. "No Temari . _You're_ all I have left."

Her response escaped Kankuro's ears as he closed the door quickly behind him leaving her alone in the Kazekage's office.

Temari grit her teeth in anger. "I can't deny that there is some truth to what he says." Temari's features softened once more as she turned to the bookshelf that stood on the right side of the room facing the desk. It was indeed a monstrous bookshelf. Made of a strong oak, the bookshelf had a regal finish to it that made it look as if it would hold up for generations while still looking impressive. The sheer amount of books on the shelf was further proof of that. Upon closer inspection, Temari realized that it was also in alphabetical order. She let her eyes wonder through the numerous books before she laid eyes on a book in the bottom right-hand corner that went unlabeled. Her curiosity peaked; she walked over the shelf and reached down for the book. As she sat down, she noticed that the binding was coming apart slightly. The cover was a deep red and lacked a title. She opened the book and saw a photo of her parents. Shocked, she turned the page only to see another one of them at some sort of festival. Her mother wore a pink kimono while her father a black one with a red sash. Her mother looked incredibly happy, with a grin that Temari missed from her early childhood.

"How long has this photo album been here?" she thought aloud.

Feeling emotional cords being pulled that she did not want revealed in public, she picked up the book and her fan and walked out. She opened the book once more. This time see saw a picture that almost broke down her tough exterior. The picture was one of her and Gaara. Gaara had a big smile on his face as he pulled at Temari's hair lightly. Temari had her left eye closed; holding her brother tight was a small smirk on her face. She pulled the picture out of its wrapping and looked on the back.

_Gaara: age 2_

_Temari: age 5_

She placed the picture back into the album and closed it again once.

"Kankuro, you're wrong. It's the three of us."

Temari took one more look at the desolate office before closing the door.

* * *

A/N: Well, this is the end of the first chapter of Legacy and my last fanfiction for this year. I've wanted to do this fanfiction for a while now, but it wasn't until recently that I finally had a reaction for each of them that I felt comfortable with. While I'm still deciding which one of the three goes first (each sibling gets their own chapter), I definitely have the reactions down. Please review and let me know what you think. Until next time.


	2. Kankuro

These are the review responses.

Uchiwa: Thank you for the review. I tried to slow down the chapter some.

Jessica: Thanks. I'll try to remember not to keep Temari so soft when her chapter comes.

reviewer: Here is the continuation. Thanks for the review.

To all those who read this and didn't review, who favored the story,who alerted the story, or who added it to a C2, thank you so much and I hope you continue reading and enjoying the story and leave your comments.

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto.

* * *

**Chapter II: Kankuro**

Kankuro stood in front of his door, probing his ninja pouch for his keys. He cursed silently as his frustration from the day's events finally began taking its toll. Moving the smoke bombs in the pouch, he felt the light jingle of the key ring. He lifted it up, noticing the two bronze keys, both looked equally worn much like the key ring they were on. He ignored the need of getting new keys and unlocked the door.

He opened the door with force, clearing out a group of clothes that stood behind the door. Kankuro took a quick whiff of the room. His face soured, but changed into an exasperated sigh moments later.

"This is definitely my room." He mulled over buying some heavy-duty air freshener before dismissing the idea. "I like it better like this." He opened his closet and carefully put his puppets in the closet. He looked at them admirably before closing the door and heading for the bathroom, grabbing some black pants and underwear and a white shirt, kicking more random things out the way.

Kankuro threw his clothes on the dirty floor and jumped into the shower to clear all the filth away from him. He watched as all the face paint slid off his body and down the drain, leaving the dirt stained shower floor. He stepped out of the shower and looked at himself in the mirror.

Disgusting.

That was his initial thoughts. He looked at himself without his face paint and could only see his father. Those dark eyes, that stern face, that same auburn spiky hair that was typically covered by his cat-eared cap, and even his build, all mimicked him. He never liked the fact that he looked the most similar to his father. Compared to Gaara and Temari who looked more like their mother with those aqua colored eyes, Kankuro had his eyes compared to the dark, lifeless ones that had become a stable of his fathers.

Every time he would hear someone say, "You look just like your father," the few times, and there were very few times, he didn't have his face-paint on, he would get sick to his stomach. Thoughts of 'you're comparing _me_ to _that_ man,' or 'that's insulting' would ring in his mind as hate would become more and more apparent on his face leaving the person who said it to ask what was wrong. Kankuro would make a random outburst of anger and frustration. If it were to a superior ninja, he would try to dismiss it and get out the situation as quickly as possible.

After the first few times that happened, he began to wear face paint under the cover that he wanted to blend in with his surroundings better. It seemed to work, and the comments came less, but nonetheless, the thought is still occupied in his mind.

It disgusted him more that his personality was similar to his father. The phrase "like father, like son" never sat well with him. He was cold like his father. He was sure in his convictions like his father. Everything that he did seemed to be a shadow of his father, and it revolted him. Nothing he could do would change that. In a way, he was happy that his father died the way he did.

Betrayed. Just like he did to his children.

He slapped himself in the face a couple of times before opening the cabinet below his sink and pulled out his toothbrush and signature face paint. Satisfied with his physical appearance, he put on his clothes and walked outside of his room.

He looked around at his room. It was like a tornado had come and set itself in his room. From where Kankuro stood at the door to his bathroom, he could see clothes strewn on the floor. He looked down and picked up a bag of opened chips and stared eating. The stale taste did little to help his mood as he continued to look around. His bed was unmade, more than a few articles of food lie on the floor, from ramen and chips to sushi and beef. Bugs littered all over the floor, and some of Kankuro's face paint had found it's way on his white walls.

"No wonder Temari never came into my room." Temari was a closet neat freak. Despite her crude, overbearing personality, she had a few unexpected quirks. Being a neat freak was one of them, much like their father was. Kankuro grit his teeth before a brief smile that showed happiness came across his face. He was happy that outside of appearance, Kakuro and his dad differed at least in their views of cleanliness.

The Kazekage always kept anywhere he went clean. Some thought he was obsessive-compulsive, but he always refuted this. Either way, every time Kankuro drops something on the floor in a fit of untidiness, something inside himself feels happier than before. As if, every time he does something that trashes his room further, he is spitting on his hated father's face.

At least that's how Kankuro forced himself to look at the situation.

He looked out the window. The sandstorm blocked him from seeing long distance, but he could faintly see a man and a woman carrying groceries going down the street. Gradually, he could see the silhouettes of the two people fade away as the sandstorm increased dramatically in strength. Kankuro arched an eyebrow.

"Sandstorms can get bad, but usually aren't this bad at this time of the year. Unless…"

Kankuro's thought process left him once he heard a beast-like growl that sent shivers up and down his spine. He felt his body shake slightly, but managed to ignore it.

"Gaara," Kankuro uttered. He shook his head dismissively. "I guess those two people are dead." Kankuro stepped over a half eaten bag of chips, feeling the crunch of roaches at the bottom of his feet. He was used to the crunching of bugs by now. The crunch was different. It reminded him of the ninjas that his father used to send to kill Gaara.

The appalling noise that Gaara's Sand Coffin would make as it crushed the life out of the helpless victim never left him. He shook the image out of his head. It was so long ago. He looked back at the window, thinking back to when his father first started trying to kill Gaara.

"_Dad, why are you going to kill Gaara?" Kankuro looked at his dad with wide-eyed wonder, holding his breath for his next words._

"_He's become disposable. He's too dangerous, and thus needs to be exterminated." His dad spoke in a matter-of-fact tone that revealed no emotion or remorse for what he just did._

_Kankuro took a step back. The coldness his father displayed was shocking. Kankuro could feel a slight difficulty in breathing. He composed himself long enough to ask the next question._

"_Why? He's my brother. He's your son. What about Mom?"_

"_Your mom is dead, Kankuro. That monster of a brother killed her. If anything, you should be hoping he dies too." The Kazekage stood up and left the room leaving Kankuro staring at the ground. _

"_Gaara…killed mom?" He held a look of bewilderment as he stared at the floor of the Kazekage's Office alone._

Kankuro shook the image out of his mind. "That was probably when my opinion of Gaara really went downhill," Kankuro mused.

The conversation he had with Temari rang in his head again.

"_I can't believe you find it so easy to forgive him, Temari. He's a monster. One wrong move, and you're dead. Do you honestly expect me to forgive him because he said 'I'm sorry' after getting his butt handed to him by that Uzumaki kid? No. Brother or not, I know what he really is. It's time for you to wake up and see that too. I'm leaving." _

_He noticed Temari rising from her chair as he reached for the doorknob. "Kankuro, he's our brother. He's all we have left."_

"_No Temari. You're all I have left."_

He contemplated the conversation once more and shook his head. "Nope, still ain't buying it."

The words 'he's all we have left,' appeared in his mind again before they were calmly replaced with other ideas. He pulled out the puppets from the closet and set them on the bed before sitting down on the bed himself. Kankuro reached into his nightstand and pulled out a towel and polish and began working on Karasu.

He looked outside to see that the sandstorm was still going strong.

* * *

A/N: Sorry for the long layoff by here is the second chapter. This section is Kankuro. So let me know your thoughts. Leave a review and let me know what you like or don't like. Until next time.


	3. Temari

Thank you Shao-Jung and The Black Rose 1995 for reviewing.

To all those who read this and didn't review, who favored the story,who alerted the story, or who added it to a C2, thank you so much and I hope you continue reading and enjoying the story and consider leaving your comments this time.

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto.

**

* * *

Chapter III: Temari**

CRASH!

Temari watched the drink slide down the peach colored wall before turning her attention to the now shattered glass on the floor. She put her hands on her head and sat in silence in front of a small coffee table that occupied a corner of her room. He was gone. He was finally gone, but it lacked the finality that she hoped for.

She was certain that she would feel different about this. She was certain that she would feel relieved, happy, or in the very least the knot in her stomach whenever he was in her thought process would leave. Now, the feeling was worse. She felt empty. As if Orochimaru pulled the floor from underneath her and left her to fall. Temari chuckled to herself.

"What am I doing? I almost started crying. Since when was the last time I cried? Probably when Mom died." Temari shifted her focus back to the broken pieces of glass on the floor. She sighed deeply.

"I guess I should clean that up." Temari pushed herself away from the table and walked over to the giant mess that she made. Temper was always a weak point for Temari. She was sure she got that from her father. He was never the most patient person, especially when it came to training. His training regimes were always rough saying that "as the Kazekage's child you should be powerful." He did not accept failure or a lackadaisical performance on the training field. A bright spot though was the fan that she bore in battle was commissioned to be made by her father saying that the fan was fitting for her and that a great warrior from Sunagakure's past wielded a similar weapon to perfection. He was right; the weapon soon became a part of her.

Still, that didn't make her feel as though she should be sad over her father's untimely death. She could feel the blood rushing to her cheeks as she dumped the glass and wet rag into the trash can. Staring at the room, one thing was clear, it was clean. Not a thing was disorganized or out of place.

Temari rolled her eyes at herself; she was such a neat freak, yet another trait of her father. He never had things in disarray, and instilled in her that everything had its place. However, when she looked in the mirror, all she saw was her mother, Karura.

The facial features and the eyes were clearly from her mother. Her personality was clearly from her father. Temari shrugged. "That's how it's supposed to be, right? Everyone shares traits from both parents." Her eyes narrowed. Temari loved her mother deeply. She remembered every day going out and growing different plants with her mother, something that she continues to this day. A small smile showed as she turned toward the window where two small shrubs in a plain clay pot rested. She walked over and stared at the plants for a moment, thinking of all the good moments with her mother.

Still, as with everything else, her father prevented her from being completely happy with every memory of her mother. She thought back to just before Gaara was born. When she was younger, she used to be nosy and listen to her parents conversations through the door. On occasion, the door would be cracked so she could see. Unfortunately this was the one time she wished she minded her own business.

"_You WILL give birth to the Shukaku." The Kazekage's voice was rough, catching his wife off-guard. She bit her lip before screaming back._

"_This is our CHILD! You can't do something like this. You can't curse our son to share the same fate as you." Karura pointed an accusing finger at another man standing beside the Kazekage. He was old, the wrinkles on his face scrunched up even more as he glared at the accusing finger before releasing a dry, hacking cough that showed that he didn't have much time left alive._

"_Your son must become a Jinchuriki. It is the rule that the Jinchuriki must be someone of close relation to the Kazekage and his family. His son is the perfect candidate. Karura placed a protective hand on her growing belly. _

"_No! He doesn't want that. Gaara doesn't want that. Please don't do it," Karura's voice became more frantic. She turned to the older woman on the other side of the Kazekage. "Lady Chiyo, please, help me. Don't do this to him. Seal it inside me." _

_Chiyo shifted her eyes to the floor. "That's not possible." She said in a voice barely audible. "It must be a child. It's for the village. Please try to understand."_

"_Understand? I understand that Gaara means nothing to you except to be used as a tool." Karura looked at her husband's cold eyes and saw no wavering in them. "Please," she mumbled as she stepped backwards, cornering herself into the far right corner of the room, the hand never leaving her baby. The look of fear in her eyes was a look that Temari would never forget as long as she lived. _

"_Don't make this difficult," the Jinchuriki said as the two men walked slowly toward her. "I have already resigned to my fate; you should do the same." Chiyo began making hand signs as a strange chakra began surrounding her entire body._

_Tears began streaking down Karura's eyes. "Please don't do this," she mumbled. "Please!" Karura yelled. _

_Temari ran at that point with the sound of his mother's sobs ringing in her ears._

She had to fight back tears now. Nothing hurts more than to watch your mother suffer at the hands of your father. It made it even worse when she died later. She can _never _forgive him for that. Ever since that point, Temari became a mother to Kankuro. She knew that she needed to be. She started becoming a bit more bossy, a bit more demanding, a bit more concerned with her brother's well-being. Just overall more motherly. They certainly weren't going to find love from their father. Temari tried as hard as she could to get closer to Gaara. At first, she made some connections with him, but she was always, always intimidated of him. Overtime, that fear became so overwhelming that she simply shunned Gaara all-together. Soon she saw something change in Gaara. Something so terrible that it warped him completely. The sand became his mother, and her brother became a murderer. It got so bad that their father had to kill his son.

Temari grit her teeth together. Not simply in hate of her father's actions, but the fact that she was so afraid to approach Gaara. In fact, she still was. Everything about him makes her uneasy, and she still remains on her guard around him. She thought about how Gaara had changed after that Uzumaki kid beat him. She was still in disbelief that he lost, and even more in disbelief that Gaara _apologized. _Apologizing was the last thing he expected Gaara to do.

"I hope that this change is real. I can't stay on-guard like this forever." As much as she wanted to believe, she couldn't shake what Kankuro said:

_"I can't believe you find it so easy to forgive him, Temari. He's a monster. One wrong move, and you're dead. Do you honestly expect me to forgive him because he said 'I'm sorry' after getting his butt handed to him by that Uzumaki kid? No. Brother or not, I know what he really is. It's time for you to wake up and see that too."_

Kankuro was right to an extent. Temari has not forgiven him yet, however, she wants to try to repair the shattered relationship. Is it possible? Probably not, but it was worth hoping.

"Yeah right. If that happens, I'll go to Konoha and find that kid and kiss his feet and crown him Hokage or whatever he was babbling about." It was true. She wanted three of them together, because in all honesty all they had was each other.

She looked out the window and stared at the sandstorm outside. It was getting pretty bad outside. A part of her was wondering if Gaara was causing it.

* * *

A/N: Sorry for the long layoff College is rough. Anyway, here is the third chapter. This section is for Temari. Gaara is next. So let me know your thoughts. Leave a review and let me know what you like or don't like. It gives me incentive not to go on a year-long hiatus again. Until next time.


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